The duke motioned for Abigail to claim her seat and moved deeper into the room, sitting in the wide King Louis chair alongside the yellow velvet sofa. “You are well, Abigail?”
“Oh, very,” Abigail replied as she took her seat. “Thank you for taking me in.”
The duke folded his arms across his broad chest. “That is what family does, Abigail.” He frowned. “My father was a foolish, pompous man. He sent your mother away because he disapproved of her wedding your father.”
“My father was a footman.” Abigail felt the need to remind him.
A snorting laugh escaped her uncle. “I didn’t say she made an ideal match. But I’d not turn out my own child and force them across the ocean for anything.”
Abigail’s breath hitched, and she knew the moment her uncle realized what he’d said. He sat back in his chair with a sigh. “Your parents love you dearly, Abigail.”
“Yes.” Or they had. She suspected Mama and Papa would never truly forgive Abigail her great offense. For that matter, Abigail could not find fault with their decision. They still must consider dear Lizzie, who would one day wed. As a fallen woman, Abigail had greatly hindered her sister’s future opportunities.
“Your parents want you to make a proper match.”
She stiffened and smoothed her palms over her skirts. “I—”
“Need to, Abigail,” he interrupted, his tone a blend of gentle concern and stiff resolve. “Eventually the reason for your visit to London will reach Polite Society.”
Abigail glanced down at her feet. Some rumor or another about her scandalous past would eventually find its way into London drawing rooms. She’d allowed herself to hope, foolishly, that the distance would protect her.
Her uncle was relentless. “Do you aspire to a family?”
Abigail blinked, momentarily taken aback by the unexpectedness of the question. In spite of Alexander’s treachery, she still longed for a family of her own.
“Your silence is your answer, Abigail.”
Geoffrey’s image flitted through her mind. “I’ll not trap a gentleman into marriage.”
Her uncle leaned back in his chair, folding his arms across his broad chest. “I’m not asking you to trap a gentleman. You come from noble origins. You are a strong, courageous woman. Not many would brave a long, ocean voyage alone, as you did.”
She managed a smile. “I grew up on the water, Uncle.”
A wistful smile tipped his lips up at the corner. “Yes. I do forget that. My sister lived a whole life without me knowing any part of it.”
The former Duke of Somerset had cut Abigail’s mother, Lady Margaret, out of the fabric of the family as neatly as snipping the thread off a garment. Abigail’s parents had made a life for themselves in America, with Papa ultimately becoming a prosperous, and very successful shipping magnate. Her family had only been welcomed back into the folds of their English family after grandfather had died.
Her uncle spoke, interrupting her ponderings. “Your father asked that I give you this.” He reached into the front pocket of his coat and withdrew a folded parchment emblazoned with her father’s wax seal.
She’d expected it would take more than a month for her family to get word to her across the ocean.
“The ship’s captain carried it over, and your father asked that I pass it to you when I felt you were ready to read the contents of the note.”
Abigail accepted the thick parchment with tremulous fingers. Nearly every day in this foreign land, she’d longed for some word from home. At her most rational times, she realized that their disappointment in her had surely killed all affection. In her most optimistic times, she’d hoped they had forgiven her enough to at least write.
“Thank you, Uncle,” she murmured.
She waited until he took his leave, and then shifted her focus to the letter. Abigail tore into the note with the same enthusiasm she had in tearing into Cook’s confectionary treats.
Her eyes scanned the single sheet of parchment.
My dear daughter,
By this time, you are safely and comfortably settled in London. It is mine and your mother’s greatest wish that you at last find happiness. As much as we’d wished for you to have a marriage based off love, we realize your comfort and happiness requires you to find a suitable gentleman who will properly care for you.
Please understand, my wishes for you stem from the life I myself knew. I hope you can someday understand that.
It was signed simply.
Your Father
Abigail frowned, turning the note over in her hands. Disappointment stabbed at her breast. After sending her away he’d penned a mere…she jabbed her finger at the paper, one, two, three, four, five sentences? She fisted the parchment into a ball, and tossed it on the table in front of her.
Her father, her uncle, and mother, everyone’s greatest concern was her marital state. What she’d done, so very shameful and wrong of a lady, had resulted in her exile. Was that penance not enough that she should now turn her life over to the hands of a gentleman to save her reputation?
As Abigail sat there, she considered the urging of her father and uncle. They wanted her to make a speedy match, and she would honor their wishes in at least entertaining an honorable gentleman’s suit.
Her uncle had been clear—Abigail needed to make a match before word of her scandal found its way to England.
However, Abigail rather feared the only man who'd stirred her interest since she'd arrived in London, was the highly proper Lord Redbrooke.
A gentleman is obligated to make the most advantageous match with a proper, respectable young lady.
4th Viscount Redbrooke
~6~
Geoffrey tugged back the curtains and peered out at the passing London streets as his mother prattled on and on. Since the carriage had departed his townhouse, bearing them to Lord and Lady Essex’s ball, his mother had filled the silence, it seemed, not taking a moment to so much as breathe. One of the great travesties in honoring ones obligations as a nobleman was the constant barrage of inane amusements a gentleman was forced to attend.
“Attending another ball,” his mother said on a laugh.
After Lord Hughes’s soirée last evening, Geoffrey would be glad to never step foot in another crowded ballroom.
“Which of course can only indicate your interest in making a respectable match…”
He sighed.
“…with a proper lady.”
He’d consider it a very fine day when he was wed, and freed from attending another blasted ball.
Only, a winsome American beauty flitted through his silent musings.
“It is the Lady Beatrice!”
Geoffrey’ flinched as his mother’s high-pitched cry filled the confines of the black lacquer carriage.
He dropped the curtain back into place, and frowned. “Mother, remember yourself.”
Her smile widened and she leaned across the carriage to swat him on the arm. “You sly, dear boy. You left me to wonder as to the identity of the woman you’d chosen for your viscountess. But Lady Beatrice Dennington, why there is no finer match,” She frowned. “Well, perhaps Lady Diana.” Mother tapped a finger against her lip. “Then, Lady Diana is a mere marquess’ daughter, and you, dear boy, have landed a duke’s daughter.”
Geoffrey’s jaw hardened. “I’ve not landed anyone, Mother.” Not for the first time, he wondered about the American woman’s identity.
“Are you listening to me, Geoffrey?”
She’d uttered the name, Dionysus.
He furrowed his brow. The name, of a Greek God. Something so very odd. Geoffrey went back to his university days and struggled to drag up the story of Dionysus.
“Geoffrey, I said, are you listening to me?”
“Yes.” No.
Mother’s frown said she knew he lied. “I was suggesting we host a dinner party.” She clapped her hands together as though in doing so, the matter was settled. “Yes. We shall have a dinner party and invite the D
uke and Lady Beatrice.” Her eyes twinkled. “Why, we shall even invite Lady Diana. After all one can never be too confident in a lady’s affections and Lady Diana would also make you a splendid match.” She wrinkled her nose. “No unseemly relations there, as far as I’m aware, and I am aware of these things, you know.”
“No, dinner parties,” Geoffrey said harshly. He preferred to launch a swift courtship and avoid as much of Polite Society as possible.
His mother’s face took on a pitched look. “No dinner parties? Hmph. Very well.”
As his mother carried on, he pulled back the curtains and peered out into the dark London streets clogged with conveyances. Marriage to Lady Beatrice or Lady Diana had seemed the very best options for him when he’d drafted that bloody list.
They both fit with one of his additional requirements— they were exceedingly dull.
Lord and Lady Essex’s townhouse pulled into focus. The front windows filled with candlelight, cast a warm, fiery glow out into the street. Normally one who loathed soirees, in this particular instance, Geoffrey rather found he preferred the mad crush of Lady Essex’s ballroom to his mother’s company.
He shoved the door open.
“Geoffrey!” His mother gasped as he stepped down without the benefit of a servant’s help.
“I’ll hardly come to harm opening my own door, Mother,” he drawled.
She snapped her burgundy silk skirts, and glared at him. “There are appearances to maintain. Why, we do not need people wondering about your eagerness and attributing it to Lady Beatrice.” She stepped over the muddied path with Geoffrey’s assistance, and made her way to their host’s entrance. “After all, ladies do not favor an eager gentleman.” She nodded her head. “It is a certainty.”
He bit the inside of his cheek to keep from pointing out that they also didn’t favor a possible future mother-in-law who harped.
Geoffrey gave silent thanks when they reached the receiving line.
Laughter blended with the lively music being played by Lord Essex’s proficient orchestra.
His mother scanned the sea of nobles. “I’m off to join Lady Ashford, and do remember, you mustn’t appear too eager.”
Geoffrey briefly closed his eyes and sent a prayer skyward for patience, grateful when his mother hurried off to greet one of Society’s most notorious gossips.
“There you are, brother!”
His sister slipped by several couples deep in conversation, earning frowns of annoyance, which by her smile, she seemed wholly oblivious to.
She leaned up and kissed Geoffrey on the cheek.
He stiffened at her public showing of affection.
Sophie laughed and swatted at his arms. “Oh, you’re ever so stodgy. Surely it is permissible to show affection for one’s sister?”
“Surely it is not,” he said in clipped tones.
Sophie waggled a brow. “Even if one’s sister has some rather beneficial information?” She dangled that piece like the bait he used to fish his well-stocked lake in Kent.
He feigned a yawn. He’d had nearly twenty-two years of perfecting stoic control where his sister was concerned.
She let out an indignant huff. “Very well. If you’d rather I not point out exactly where Lady Beatrice is, and allow you to find her through this great crush of…” her eyes lit up as he surveyed the crowd. “Ahh, I see I have your notice now, brother.”
She did.
He’d simply developed enough self-control not to say as much.
Sophie leaned close, and whispered, “She is at the central portion of the ballroom floor, conversing with her brother, the Marquess of Westfield.”
Geoffrey gave a curt nod. “Thank you.”
She pointed her eyes toward the ceiling. “There really is no need to thank me. After all, family helps one another, no?”
Before Geoffrey knew what she intended, Sophie leaned up once more and placed another kiss upon his cheek and then hurried off, her figure swallowed up by the crowd of people.
With a single-minded purpose, Geoffrey started toward Lady Beatrice and her brother, Lord Westfield, taking care to walk the perimeter of the floor and avoid the circle of couples performing the quick steps of La Boulanger. His eyes focused on the crop of golden curls and the lady’s flushed cheeks. She really was quite lovely, possessing all the attributes of a flawless English beauty.
After a long night of battling improper yearnings for a tempting American, Geoffrey had managed to rise that morning and brush the memory of her aside. He didn’t need an unconventional miss with a ready smile for unfamiliar gentlemen. No, Lady Beatrice would never do something as forward as to continue to engage a gentleman as Abigail Stone had when he’d stepped upon her gown last evening.
Geoffrey reached Lady Beatrice’s side. The young lady stiffened and for a moment Geoffrey detected a flash of disappointment in her eyes.
He claimed her hand and bowed over it. “My lady, it is most agreeable seeing you this evening.”
The young lady lowered her eyes to the floor, with what seemed to be a perpetual blush upon her fair cheeks.
Marquess of Westfield greeted him with a bow. “Redbrooke, a pleasure as usual.” The dry edge of humor in Westfield’s tone suggested the marquess’ words were not wholly sincere. Westfield inclined his head. “Ahh, forgive my lack of manners. Allow me to introduce you to my cousin.” He shifted, revealing a young lady clad in a sapphire blue satin creation fully engaged in conversation with the Earl of Sinclair.
There was something so very familiar about the elegant lines of her back, the graceful flare of her hips…
A loud humming filled Geoffrey’s ears and he knew with a certainty he’d be willing to wager the Redbrooke line on, the identity of Lady Beatrice’s cousin before the lady even fully revealed herself. “Lord Redbrooke may I present Miss Abigail Stone.”
At that precise moment, Abigail said something to Lord Sinclair, who tossed his head back and laughed. She turned around.
And froze like the deer who’d caught sound of Geoffrey’s hunting dogs.
Geoffrey sucked in a breath. His eyes traveled the high planes of her cheekbones, the charcoal gray irises of her eyes, the full lower lip, the…
Her eyes widened.
“You,” she breathed.
Geoffrey’s mind spun. This warrioress who’d battled Lord Carmichael, his American Helen of Troy, was in fact Lady Beatrice’s cousin. He silently reviewed all the research his solicitor had done on Lady Beatrice. The information he’d uncovered about the young lady had indicated there were American relatives there. It had not, however, indicated she had a cousin with a fulsome laugh and silken tresses as black as sin.
Lady Beatrice’s brow wrinkled, and she alternated her gaze between Abigail and Geoffrey. “You know Lord Redbrooke?”
Abigail and Geoffrey looked at one another and silence stretched out into an awkward pause.
The Marquess of Westfield settled a hard, narrow-eyed stare upon Geoffrey. “You two have met?” he asked, repeating his sister’s earlier question.
Abigail and Geoffrey spoke in unison.
“Yes.”
“No.”
Christ.
Abigail discreetly coughed. “Uh, that is to say, no, we have not.”
Westfield’s brows lowered, and rogue that he was, surely recognized his cousin wasn’t being altogether truthful.
Lord Sinclair used the opportunity to interject. “Perhaps, Miss Stone referred to her meeting at Lord Hughes’s ball?” He looked to Geoffrey and grinned. “I believe you knocked down Miss Stone? Or was it a servant?”
Geoffrey clenched his teeth, resisting the urge to point out that he hadn’t knocked down either Miss Stone or a servant. Considering the precariousness of the current exchange, he supposed he should be far more grateful for Sinclair’s intervention. Except, presenting him as a bumbling, graceless lord would hardly help him in his quest for Lady Beatrice’s hand.
Why did that possibility not alarm him as much as it
should?
“Lord Redbrooke did not knock a servant down,” Abigail murmured. She angled her head. “Nor did he knock me down. He nearly knocked me down.”
Laughter moved throughout the group, but it served its purpose and Westfield dropped his questioning.
Geoffrey studied Abigail, so composed and seemingly unaffected by his presence. Geoffrey held her gaze. “Are you well, Miss Stone?”
Abigail appeared to understand his unspoken question. She inclined her head. The subtle movement only served to elongate the impossibly long neck. “I am, my lord. Thank you.”
“I am trying to convince Miss Stone to dance with me,” Sinclair said to the group. He held a hand to his chest. “Alas, it appears I’ve failed to appropriately charm the lady into partnering me.”
Good. He’d rather send Sinclair to the devil than out onto the dance floor with Abigail. Something tight, and wholly uncomfortable gripped Geoffrey’s chest. Something that felt very nearly like jealousy, which made very little sense considering Geoffrey’s intentions for Lady Beatrice. It shouldn’t matter to him if Abigail partnered with Lord Sinclair or the Prince Regent himself.
“I’ve told His Lordship that I’d hardly repay his kindness by trodding upon his toes,” Abigail said with a laugh.
“You do not dance, Miss Stone?” Geoffrey’s taciturn question killed the levity amongst the group.
She shook her head, and seemed the only person immune to his severity, for she smiled up at him. “To my mother’s chagrin, I’m rather deplorable.”
His attention should be reserved for the woman who would one day, if all went to plan, become his future viscountess. Instead, he fixed his gaze to Abigail. “Was it that you did not have suitable instructors in America?”
Lady Beatrice gasped, and it occurred to him, too late, the pomposity of such a question. Even before his most jaded days, he’d never been capable of the effortless charm as exhibited by rogues like Sinclair.
Geoffrey shook his head. “Forgive me. I…”
Abigail waved off his apology. “I assure you, Papa hired some of the most proficient instructors from Europe. I however, proved a remarkably poor study.”
Always Proper, Suddenly Scandalous Page 5
